Still Here
by catkid3
Summary: His demons were never vanquished, just ignored. But they always come back to play when the darkness is all that's visible...
1. Chapter 1

_A/N: This takes place after the series finale. If you're someone who likes to listen to specific songs while reading, I recommend listening to the nightcore versions of 'Still Here' by Digital Daggers and 'Calling All the Monsters'; they are what gave me the inspiration for this story. Enjoy!_

 ** _Still Here_**

 _"_ _You don't really believe they'll forgive you."_

House sat back in bed, massaging his thigh. The pain was burning more intensely than other nights. A glance at his phone revealed he'd only been asleep for an hour.

An hour was still something if it meant she went away, but of course she was back.

"I should've used more alcohol."

"They'll never forgive you," Amber sat on the edge of the bed, straightening her skirt. "After what you've pulled-"

"Yeah, I get it. I'm a suicidal maniac whose best friend is dying. I'm a freaking fugitive who died in a house fire. Tell me something I don't know," House pulled the covers further up his body. "You've been gone a while."

"You've had other things to swallow besides drugs."

"Don't you go digging in the gutter, missy-"

"I meant Wilson. Remember that, House?" Amber's gaze narrowed. "Wilson is dying. **James** is dying. You can't save him."

"Thanks, Captain Obvious."

"The genius Gregory House can't save his best friend! He saves dictators and murderers, but doesn't save a friend! What is he to do?" Amber feigned disappointment.

"Can't you go haunt someone else?" House grumbled.

"You haven't thought past that though. What will you do when he goes? Hmm? You have no one else left-"

"Besides you." House answered grimly.

Amber smirked. "You know I'll never disappear? I'm always here inside your mind."

"If you were naked every time I saw you, I wouldn't mind."

"You perv," A different voice spoke. "The only reason you hired me was because of my boobs."

House nervously shifted his gaze to the doorway. "Why are you here?"

Cameron tucked her hair behind her ears and moved towards House. Her skin glowed faintly in the darkness. "You're part of the reason my marriage disintegrated."

House shifted slightly. "It was your boyfriend who killed that guy, not me."

"You did nothing to stop it though!" Cameron insisted.

"I solved a lot of problems, remember?" House pointed out. "I'm also the reason you and the wombat did some hanky-panky at a patient's house."

Amber groaned in disgust. "Did you seriously do that?"

"Let's forget that part." Cameron snapped.

House thought for a second. "Ah. I see now. You're here so I can have an existential crisis. Nice."

"That's not the only reason." A fourth voice appeared from the window. She moved over next to Amber, the age difference obvious in their faces.

"Cuddy?" House thought aloud. He raised his eyebrows. "Does this mean something…interesting is going to happen?"

"In your dreams. Haven't you figured it out yet?" Cuddy snapped.

"It's three AM and you guys are interrupting my beauty sleep," House began to shuffle down into the bed. "Go away."

He closed his eyes, hoping if he squeezed them tight enough, the hallucinations would stop. A minute passed before he dared to open them again. But what he saw was not welcoming.

Chase, Foreman, Kuttner and Stacy had appeared, all with black voids where their eyes should be. A glance at the others revealed the same had occurred to them. His adrenaline began pumping.

"..Are you guys trying to be Satan's minions?" House joked weakly.

The group formed a semicircle around House's bed, their jet black eyes piercing his. He heard his heart pounding in his ears.

"You ruined my love." Cameron snarled.

"You harassed me." Cuddy hissed.

"You made me lose my job." Foreman growled.

"You broke my heart." Stacy shrilled.

"You made me a murderer." Chase chimed in.

"You let me die." Kuttner snapped.

"You killed me." Amber whispered.

It had been a long time since House had felt legitimate fear. He knew his hands were shaking, clasped onto the bedsheets as a lifeline. His eyes were shut so tightly that they began to hurt.

"Stop," He breathed. "Just stop."

The voices came flying at him, screams in each ear.

"Murderer!"

"Pervert!"

"Druggie!"

"You're just gonna let me die, aren't you?"

Another voice entered the nightmare. House recognised it, but he refused to open his eyes.

"You could've done something. Anything. Yet I'm still going to die."

House couldn't take it. "Wilson, y-you know that's not true-"

"You could've helped!" The roar of his best friend raced around his eardrums. It wasn't a roar he normally heard from someone he'd annoyed; it was more of a demonic roar. "You've destroyed yourself, House. Look at all the people you've brought down with you."

A deep chorus of voices filled the air. "Now we will bring you down with us."

House refused to believe he was hyperventilating until he opened his eyes. All of the hallucinations had turned completely black, with white spots for eyes and a bright smile. Their fingers had grown longer, with points on each end. He could still tell who was who from their general outline.

Without warning, Amber hurled an object at House. Then two. Then three. They pelted him all over his torso, each one stinging more than the one before. Angry shrills came from their mouths as they assaulted House.

House waited until they had stopped before he gazed at the objects on his lap. The bed was covered in a thick layer of them, with the majority piling up around House himself. They looked familiar; small, white and capsule-shaped.

"…Vicodin?"

"Your damned drugs destroyed us more than you realise," Cuddy growled. She grinned, an image that House knew he would never be able to forget. "Now it's destroyed all you love as well."

"W-Wait, hang on," House stuttered. "M-my Vicodin couldn't c-cause Wilson's cancer-"

He was drowned out as the demons closed in on him. Their pearly whites were the last remaining light in his darkened hotel room. He wanted to cry out for Wilson, for his mother even, but stayed still. In that moment he wished was anywhere - even in hell - rather than there.

House let himself loose, clamping his eyes closed again. "Leave me ALONE!"

He waited until the screams and shrills had faded before checking. The room was as it was before; clothes crumpled across the floor, an empty keg of beer against the door, Wilson's jacket hanging over the chair.

It was as it should've been.

Until he heard Amber: "We're still here. And demons don't hide, Greg."


	2. Chapter 2

_A/N: I had originally intended this to be a oneshot, but a lovely guest review gave me some inspiration, so thank you to whoever you are! :)_

"I want to sleep, House."

Wilson's clammy hands were grasped tightly around his friend's. His eyes were maroon red, beads of sweat dangling off the edge of his nose. His morphine had been maxed out, the pain having kept him awake for days. "Let me sleep."

House tried not to look at the vital monitor. He'd hidden Wilson for as long as he could, until his condition had deteriorated too rapidly. The nurses had given him as much medicine and tea as he could stand, but Wilson was far past the point of no return.

"Please don't, WIlson," House growled.

"It's time, Greg," Wilson rasped. "Please..let me sleep.."

"You are not dying on me, dammit!" House's grip tightened. It took him a moment to register that he was crying from the damp spots on Wilson's sheets. "..Wilson, you can't leave me."

"I'll be with Amber again and you get my motorbike…It's a fair deal."

House knew Wilson was trying to make light of the situation. "We need to work on your sense of humour for the afterlife."

His best friend gave a faint snigger. "..Where do you..suppose I'll go, House?"

"In a hole in the ground."

"I meant **me**. Not my body," Wilson coughed. "..Do you think there is a hell?"

"I've told you before, Jimmy, that's something nuns believe in. You're not a nun."

"I'm scared, House. I'm scared and I don't care what you think!" Wilson attempted to cry with what little strength he had left. "..I don't want to die."

"I think I already knew that," House wiped away some of his friend's excess sweat. "..Just don't think about that, okay? Think..happy thoughts."

"You sound like a hippie."

House forced himself to smile. "Thanks."

Wilson tried to laugh, but instead began heaving. The heart monitor began to slow down, Wilson's eyes beginning to droop. His voice was weak. "..Thanks for it all, Greg-"

"Don't go," House pleaded. He didn't care that he was openly weeping. "Please, James, don't go."

Wilson's grip began to loosen, his hand gradually losing strength. He closed his eyes as his arm fell across his body, the sound House had dreaded for months ringing in the air. Despite his cancer-ravaged look, for the first time since the whole nightmare had begun, Wilson looked peaceful.

House considered calling for a crash cart or giving Wilson CPR. Yet he remained in his bedside chair, sobbing for the last person he cared about.

"I told you so."

House tensed. He fearfully looked up to find Amber standing next to Wilson, dressed completely in white. "Back to get the last laugh, I see?"

Amber stroked her former lover's hand. "Add him to the list, House. The list of people whose lives you've ruined."

"I never ruined his life," House grumbled. "His stupid wives did."

"How did he die, House? Do you think he died happy?" Amber whispered.

"Was I supposed to dance for him to cheer him up?"

"He still had secrets and sins to confess. How did you spend your last months together? Tramping around the countryside, having threesomes and wasting your cash! Is that a way to die happy?"

"Go easy on him," Cameron appeared in the doorway, taking House's hand in hers. "You still have us, Greg-"

"You're not real!" House snatched his hand away, jumping out of his seat.

"Like I told you before, we'll never leave you," Amber spoke gently. "We'll keep you company."

"If I talk to you then I really will be crazy."

Cameron gazed at him. "Think about it, House."

"You're my demons."

"Don't call us that. Think of us as…spiritual guides of some description."

House rubbed his eyes until they felt raw, his hands wet with his grief. "..I see I have no choice."

"That's it, House. We're still here for you," Amber stepped around the bed to come closer. "Now that Wilson's in hell, we've all you've got left."

House roared, picking up his cane and aimed to throw it at Amber. But when his gaze returned to her original position, she was gone. Cameron had vanished as well. It was as it was before; his best friend lying still, now a corpse ready for a coffin.

House threw down his cane and held Wilson's hand until doctors arrived to shut off the vital monitors. He held it up until Wilson's body was wrapped in white cloth and placed on a stretcher, being wheeled away forever.

"Don't be sad, House," Amber whispered. "We're still here for you."


	3. Chapter 3

_A/N: Apologies for the wait - I wanted to make sure it was worth your read. Hope it's not too cheesy for you. :)_

House was strewn across the floor, gasping for air. His arthritis and aching muscles meant he couldn't move around as easily as he used not - though it wasn't as though he was a marathon runner in the first place.

He laughed as a child fell on top of him and began tickling him. "Stay still, Dad!"

House pretended to be angry. "Oh no you don't, you little pirate!"

The child screamed with laughter as House rolled him onto the side, relentlessly wiggling his fingers under the child's armpits.

A melodic voice floated from the front door. "I'll be back at ten, honey!"

House continued his tickling rampage. "Don't get too stoned!"

It took him a while to become weary and eventually settle back against the couch, his son half-dozing on his chest. An old seventies movie played on the television, a half-eaten packet of chips lying across DVDs of 'Peter Pan' and 'Matilda'.

House had a simple life; a wife, a son, a country house in Montana. Every morning he would hobble outside to feed the deer before spending his days writing and learning new songs to play. His son's favourite was 'Stairway to Heaven'.

"Daddy?"

House looked down. "Yeah?"

"Is your friend here?"

"...Not right now."

"Okay. Tell me the story again. Please?" His son sat up, puppy dog-eyeing his father.

House sighed. "Once upon a time, in a faraway castle, I was a doctor. And I treated all sorts of interesting and disgusting illnesses, including a guy who coughed up part of his lung."

"Ewww!" The child sniggered.

"I had a few friends there, but only a handful that were really important," House continued, massaging his leg. "There was Cameron the lab technician, Wilson the royal physician and Queen Lisa herself. We had some..good times together, but we didn't get along after a while and they..threw me out."

His son leaned closer. "Didn't they teach you too?"

"I learnt some things from them," House wrapped his arm around his son. "Lisa taught me the lesson of love and how easily it can go to hell. Cameron taught me how to be kind and not a complete jerk to people."

"What about Wilson?"

House bit his lip. It had been a while since he'd thought of his friend. "..He taught me to never take who loved you or your time alive for granted."

"But now you've got me, Daddy!" His son threw his arms around House. "I'll be your friend."

House returned the gesture, refusing to accept that he felt the urge to cry. "Now, how about you get your old man a Pepsi, huh?"

The child saluted and marched to the kitchen. "Yessir!"

House chuckled. "Children make great slaves."

"Is that why you love him?"

His heart stopped. He directed his gaze towards the window where the voice had originated from. Amber was perched on the windowsill, dressed in pink and white. "Are you using your son as a makeshift counsellor?"

House's smile instantly faded. "You've been gone a while."

"Five years, seven months and twenty-three days, to be exact," Amber fiddled with a loose strand of hair. "You didn't really think I'd ever go away?"

"The others did."

"I'll never fade, Greg."

"Don't call me that," House snapped. "..It isn't my name anymore."

"Why don't you tell your son that? Or your wife, perhaps?" Amber smiled. "You're afraid of rejection, aren't you?"

"All I'm doing is telling my son stories using people I knew to make sure he falls asleep at night. That doesn't make him my counsellor; the kid doesn't even know his mom's pregnant again yet. He doesn't know what sex is-"

"You're using him, House, even if you won't admit it."

"It's not like I'm abusing the kid!"

"Think about it. You've got ten years of unshed tears inside you, so how do you release it?" Amber stood up, straightening her blouse. "Through fairies and ogres."

"Princes and princesses. Get it right."

"Is she there, Dad?" The child returned with a can, handing it to House. He waved at the air. "Hi Amber!"

Smiling softly, Amber returned the wave. She gave House a sly grin. "You haven't told him what I really am, have you?"

"What'd she say?"

House paused, glancing between his past and future. "That she knows I love you, James."


End file.
